MSNBC signs conservative columnist Bret Stephens

MSNBC and NBC News have signed conservative New York Times columnist Bret Stephens as an on-air contributor.

MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace announced the hiring during her 4 p.m. ET program on Wednesday.

“We’re so, so, so lucky and happy to have you,” Wallace said.

{mosads}

Stephens is a Pulitzer Prize winner who came to prominence at The Wall Street Journal before jumping to the Times earlier this year.

MSNBC has hired several conservative figures in recent months, including nationally-syndicated radio host Hugh Hewitt. The network gave Hewitt his own program on Saturday mornings that launched last week.

Wallace, a former spokesperson in President George W. Bush’s administration, was also recently awarded her own program in the spring.

Former Fox News contributor George Will, another conservative commentator, was signed by the network in May.

Stephens’s first column for the Times calling into question arguments around climate change published in April was met with heavy criticism from liberal readers of the newspaper, with many cancelling subscriptions to the point that Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. made a personal appeal to readers to address the Stephens hiring.